Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my team with the member for Cape Breton—Canso.
First, I would like to echo the comments made by the member for Surrey North. I am sure the member would also agree that those issues are important not only to the North Surrey but also to all the people of Surrey and North Delta.
When the Minister of Finance was in my riding, I was very shocked and ashamed that he would not take questions. I was honoured to attend that event, but the minister did not take the questions from the people who attended that luncheon. We would have pointed out the truth, if we had been given an opportunity.
The best thing I can say about the budget is it offers no surprises. When we know what the government is about, that is not exactly good news. The budget is predictable, as predictable as another conviction for a repeat offender.
We knew the government would bring in a one per cent reduction in GST, despite the fact that no credible economist would tell us that this would do anything positive for the Canadian economy. Nor will it provide Canadians with real, measurable savings. It is terrible fiscal policy. It cannot add fire to an already white hot consumer economy. It is bad economics because it discourages personal savings. We knew the government would do it. It looked good in its campaign ad to drop the GST from seven per cent to six per cent. That is a government of optics, not substance.
We knew the government would try to tell Canadians that it had cut income taxes across the board, despite the fact that it has effectively raised the rate paid by the lowest income bracket.
Allow me to translate lowest income bracket. That would be the poorest Canadians. The government has taken away a Liberal tax reduction of 15% and raised the rate paid by those who need a tax break more than anyone else. However, as I said, we knew this would happen. Yet there is no pleasure to be had in saying “I told you so” about the government.
What we did not anticipate was the level of cynicism and contempt this budget shows to Canadians who believe that government can be a force of good in people's lives, that it can project a vision for a real future for all Canadians, that it should not cater to a patchwork collection of resentments, but should foster our hopes and ideals. What do I mean?
Let us take a look at the environment. Let us take a look at the 93% cut to overall funding and the 100% cut to funding for programs that address environmental change. In its place there is nothing but a $10 million tax initiative for biofuels and $370 million over two years for a transit tax credit. It would be laughable if it were not such a tragic betrayal that shows absolute disregard for the well-being of future generations.
However, we know how the government will respond. The environment minister will stand in the House and tell us that it is working on a made in Canada solution to climate change in place of the Kyoto commitment that the Liberal government signed.
This is not the first time we have seen her co-opt the language of true progressive government in order to spin the government's caveman policies. Last year in the House she spoke of not letting any old white guys dictate to young Canadian women how their child care dollars should be spent.
For those who still expect a little more substance in the House than they would expect from Oprah, she was referring to the landmark child care agreements with the provinces, which, last time when I checked, represented all Canadians, regardless of their income or where they live. She was referring to the real plan for child care workers, for child care spaces and for child care programs across the country.
Needless to say, that too is gone in this budget. I am waiting for some old white guy to tell me what it replaces it is anything more than the fistful of dollars a week and a fatally flawed plan to build more spaces.
As well, I am waiting for some old white guy to stand up and explain the betrayal of the Kelowna accord. I am curious as to how the government is going to spin that one. How will the government explain that tragedy? Perhaps the brain trust in the PMO sat down and decided that the people did not vote for them anyway, so they said let us just abandon that historic agreement, which was years in the making. They have taken away the $800 million that would have gone to aboriginal Canadians for this fiscal year and given them $150 million instead. When they complain, the government will pretend not to listen.
Welcome to the Conservative's vision for Canada. It is self-satisfied, small-minded and contemptuous of social justice. It is the people's tax dollars in action, if one could call that action. May I submit that Canadians of all backgrounds are far more respectful of the accord and what it represents than the government imagines. Even those who are relatively new to these shores have a sense of the country's history, a sense of values we all share.
If I may speak for these Canadians right now, the government should be ashamed. It should be ashamed because it had the gall to tell Canadians that it would honour, in spirit, the Kelowna accord, even though we all knew they would abandon it. Perhaps words like honour and spirit embarrass the government. Perhaps it sees no place for the ideals those words evoke. I know how it will respond. It will say that it kept its promises to Canadians, that it did what it said it would do and that there is honour in that.
To that I would say, when the bar is set so low, when the promises are about what will be taken away and what will be denied rather than affirmed, it is less a matter of honour rather than brute predictability. A promise to take the path of least resistance is a promise easily kept. All of this is understandable with that party. One could not expect any better.
Less understandable is the position of the NDP. When the next election is called and when the candidates for that party go door to door, they are sure to find one or two constituents who voted for them. When those constituents meet their candidates at the door, I can imagine the line of questioning, “Now let me get this straight: our Kyoto commitments, gone; the Kelowna accord, gone; the child care agreements, gone; the corporate tax cuts you told us the NDP were going to fight so hard to remove, there they are, back again?” The constituents will want to know why the candidates worked with the Conservatives to bring down the government. The constituents might ask why it was a good idea to abandon everything for which the NDP stood in order to win 10 more seats.
This must be the only real surprise for Canadians, who cherish progressive values, that Canada's achievements could be sold so cheaply, for the price of a little more power like the 10 seats that the NDP got.